Measuring the psychosocial impact of COVID-19 by means of the "international student well-being study questionnaire": Evidence on Italian university students.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic appeared as an unpredictable disruption of daily activities. This situation produced a unique mental health impact for the general population, youth, and vulnerable groups. A documented consequence has been alcohol abuse and impaired mental health. To our knowledge, no published study has yet evaluated the rates of depressive symptoms, academic frustration, and substance abuse in the Italian student population in the COVID era linking them to sociodemographic variables. Aims: To investigate the incidence of depressive symptoms, academic frustration, and substance abuse students developed in one university in Northern Italy during the first COVID-19 outbreak, using a student wellbeing framework borrowed from Allardt's and Bronfenbrenner's theories. Methods: Descriptive statistics, correlations, Wilcoxon test and factorial ANOVA were performed on data gathered through an online questionnaire sent to a convenience sample of university students. Data collection occurred between 18 May and June 21, 2020. Results: According to the framework used, Being was the dimension of sociodemographic variables, Having was economic support and Loving was social support. Students experienced academic frustration and related depressive symptoms. Male gender seemed to be less affected by the depressive syndrome. With regard to economic support and related repercussions on depressive symptoms, students who reported that they could not obtain a loan showed significantly higher depressive symptoms. Students benefiting from greater financial support showed less academic frustration. Age appeared to be a predictor of academic frustration since young students proved to be the most frustrated. The examined students' population showed a significant decrease in alcohol and cigarettes consumption. Conclusions: Having and Being dimensions influenced depression and academic frustration. Having and Loving dimensions were related with use of substances. The study findings support the implementation of interventions to help students, at a psychological, social, financial level aiming at fostering the quality of students' educational life.

Being an overseas student at the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery of the University of Parma: the perceptions of students from Cameroon.

UNLABELLED: There is a steady rise in the number of overseas students taking degree courses at the Medicine and Surgery faculties of Italian Universities. Numerous scholars, mainly from the English speaking world, have testified to the fact that a university teaching organisation aimed at attaining good levels of integration among students of differing cultural appurtenance is a prerequisite for success in the acquisition of good treatment practices. AIM: To explore the experience of students from Cameroon studying on the degree courses in Medicine and Surgery and in Nursing at the University of Parma, in order to discover the strong and weak points of the organisation of the courses so as to achieve a good process of integration. MATERIALS AND METHODS: An ethnographic study plan was adopted. In-depth interviews were conducted with 20 students from Cameroon enrolled in the Faculty of Medicine of Parma University: 10 in the Degree Course in Medicine and Surgery and 10 in the Degree Course in Nursing. The interviews were recorded and analysed independently by two researchers, who then pooled their results. The age of the interviewed ranges from 24 to 31, the average age is 26,5. RESULTS: Independently from the attended degree course, most of the students interviewed claim that the process of integration has not been very successful: despite attempts to open up a dialogue with their Italian counterparts in order to get to know them, the latter showed no signs of willingness to integrate. Some students develop a self-critical attitude, maintaining that it would be a good idea to strengthen their awareness of their own cultural identity so as to start from a firm base in the attempt to open up to the host society without defensive attitudes that lead to ostracism. The difficulties of socialisation are compounded by those of learning, which many attribute to the language difficulties and some to the differing academic organisation between country of origin and host country. DISCUSSION: The problem of the difficulties of integration of overseas students is not new. In other geographical locations, changes to syllabuses designed to solve the problem, at least in part, have been proposed and successfully implemented. The Italian situation is a particular one, and this preliminary study yields some ideas for the implementation of changes to the syllabuses of the Italian universities.

The psycho-social malaise of migrant private carers in Italy: a rampant, but hidden health demand.

Despite having become an essential part of the national welfare system, the Italian private care market has developed in a situation of institutional disengagement. As a consequence, this sector, which has a high presence of female migrant workers, is currently characterised by serious flaws. What are the consequences for the psycho-social well-being of migrant private carers (MPCs)? This article highlights and analyses the high correlation between migrant women's involvement in the Italian private care market and their manifestations of psycho-social malaise, the latter being one of the main factors motivating the access to health services for MPCs employed in Italy. Based on qualitative data collected in Italy in 2009-2010: 32 in-depth interviews to MPCs, a focus group discussion involving seven MPCs, and 23 semi-structured interviews to providers working in close contact with MPCs, mostly in health services, it describes how the malaise of MPCs is generated, and how it is interpreted and expressed (or not expressed) by them. In particular, it investigates the social dynamics determining the latent nature of this phenomenon, and its tendency to work silently on MPCs' subjectivities without coming to the attention of health services, which are therefore not able to prevent or limit its negative consequences. Nevertheless, this article also shows that this malaise sometimes surfaces in the health service (albeit too rarely, or too late) and how it is generally managed by health providers. In particular, a timely encounter with the health system involving  the simple externalisation and acknowledgement of this psycho-social malaise can have a crucial therapeutic value, meaningfully helping to prevent it from becoming a serious condition. On this basis, the importance is highlighted of creating channels for facilitating the meeting between this pressing but unexpressed health need and the institutions in charge of the health of society.

Training program for community health workers in remote areas in Senegal. First experience.

BACKGROUND: In some countries, community health workers (CHWs) act as a bridge between the health care delivery system and the community, and ensure primary health care. It is essential to improve health worker education and training; however, in remote areas such as rural Senegal villages, these CHWs are often unable to leave their home community for training and education. We set out to perform a training program in a village in Senegal and to evaluate its effectiveness in that village. METHODS: We prepared a training program to be based on face-to-face lessons and practical exercises; a nurse from the university of Parma carried out the training of the CHW in loco for a period of four weeks. After six months, the nurse with an anthropologist returned to the village to verify the results of the training program. RESULTS: The CHW had retained most of what she had been taught, but her opinion about the training program was not altogether positive, given that the absence of a working health centre in the village and an insufficient period of practical experience in a hospital. The village community did not understand the role of the CHW and was not informed that there was a training program to help increase her technical know-how. CONCLUSIONS: This experience confirmed the important role of the CHW in rural areas in a poor region in Senegal, in the absence of other professional healthcare figures readily accessible to the population. Nonetheless, in order to properly carry out the role of CHWs, an adequate theoretical and practical training is necessary.